The Plague: Project Emissary
by LittleZbot
Summary: A spin-off of my fanfiction "The Plague," this follows the story of Project Emissary and how the world of "The Plague" came to be in its current condition.
1. Chapter 1

**Agh! You've caught me! Here it is! This is the start of something I've been planning since February, and a large part of all the delays that's been happening with "The Plague." After I wrote this huge backstory, I realized I didn't have a good way to deliver it how I wanted. Initially, I though of exposition, but you guys know how much I hate that. I mean, I've barely told you anything about anyone! What I really wanted to do was tell this in story format, but because of the way "The Plague" is structured, I wasn't able to work it in properly. So now it's its own story! Anyway, this follows the story of Project Emissary, which may have been a huge initial part of Leo's journey, even if he doesn't know it. This takes place in the world of "The Plague" approximately 2-3 years before the start of the initial story. It can be read on its own without knowledge of "The Plague" and "The Plague" can be read without ever knowing this exists, but reading both will grant a lot more depth to both stories. Unlike "The Plague," almost every aspect of this story has been planned out and has a definite end and a set number of chapters to get there. Chapters will be released as I feel like it, but I'll do my best to get out at least one chapter of either "The Plague" or "Project Emissary" a week. So read, enjoy, and see if you can catch some of the hints about how this has already connected to the regular story (there are plenty, both subtle and not-so-subtle). And, yes, all the characters are named after emotions/ideals. This is explained in the next chapter.**

 **For those of you getting into this story late and not sure when to start, the latest released chapter of "The Plague" is Chapter 18.**

…

"Seriously?"

"I just want to take a quick look," Trust pleaded. "I won't be more than a minute. Two minutes, at most. Or three, if they have anything by Relo-"

"No," came the firm reply. "We're here for a reason, and it's not to go shopping for music boxes."

"Aw, come on. You can't expect me to just ignore the place, Joy." He gave her a winning smile. "You don't find these places every day. Can't you imagine it? Walking into the old base with some rockin' Blaze-"

"I said no," she answered. "I didn't even know you were into these things."

Trust shrugged. "Well, not especially. Somewhat. Okay, mostwhat. It's really mostly for Mills. She adores the things."

Joy shook her head and crossed her arms. "You can pick something up for her on the way back. We're not failing this one."

Trust stretched out his arms, smiling. "Oh, please, Joy. When have I ever caused you to fail anything?"

"Twenty-three."

"Twenty-three?" Trust lowered his arms, slightly confused. Then recognition spread over his face. "Oh, yeah. That was the one with the old guy and the potatoes."

Joy nodded in affirmation, then cracked a slight smile of amusement.

"What?"

"Oh, nothing. It's just how strange that would sound to anybody who didn't see it go down."

Trust shrugged again. "Well, if you think about it, pretty much all of them can be summed up in those weird ways. Forty-two, the one with the magic pony and the evil vulture. Twelve, the one with the crazed dinosaur and the diabolical slime emperor."

Joy smirked for a moment, then turned back around and continued walking. "Hurry up. We're going to miss our ride."

Trust sped up slightly and fell into step behind her. "Fifty-nine. The one with the master math teacher who sold magical manly macaroni."

Joy held up her hand. "Let's not run it into the ground, please."

"Thirty-one. The one with the fairy who hates Chinese food."

Joy sighed. "You're going to be doing this all day, now, aren't you?"

Trust smiled. "Probably."

"I never should have mentioned it."

"Probably not."

…

"Fourteen. The one that was eerily reminiscent of Peter Pan."

Joy had, for the most part, blocked out Trust's ramblings for the past fifteen minutes or however long it had taken them to get to this street, but this one caught her attention. "How did that have anything to do with Peter Pan?"

Trust grinned. "All you need is faith and trust… and just a little bit of pixie dust," he quoted.

Joy sighed. "One idiot thinking he could fly does not make it Peter Pan."

"But he said it was the power of _belief_ that helped him fly, which is pretty much the same thing as faith! That's, like, one third of the recipe! And I was there, too, so there's two/thirds!"

"Oh? Let's humor that idea for a second. Where's the pixie dust?"

This gave Trust pause. "Every theory has holes."

"How about the theory that I'll punch your face in if you keep talking?"

Trust, surprisingly, shut his mouth. For six seconds, at least, and then he asked "Why do all of our conversations end with that same threat?"

"Because," Joy answered coolly, "They're never actual conversations. It's just you pretending I'm listening until I get sick of it."

"Fair enough. But, then, why di-"

Joy clapped her hand over his mouth and rose her other hand's index finger to her lips. "Here it is," she whispered. "You'd have seen it if you weren't flapping your lips so much."

Trust shoved her hand off his mouth and turned to properly look at their location. Directly in front of them was…a totally normal-looking general store. Trust blinked once, and grabbed a map out of his back pocket just to make sure they were in the right place. Yes, they were exactly where they were supposed to be. Evidently it was just hidden quite well inside this store.

"Think it's a real place?" he whispered to Joy.

"No duh. Of course it is. I'm just wondering if it's a front for a larger operation underground or if it's just the storage location."

Trust bit his cheek. "Only one way to find out." He trotted up to the store doors before Joy could stop him and knocked. A few seconds later, the door was opened up by a middle-aged merchant who looked him over quizzically.

"You know," the merchant told him dryly, "you don't have to knock. It's an open store with a glass door."

Trust threw his arms out and began speaking as if he were in the middle of a play. "Of course I didn't _have_ to! But, tell me this, sir, have you ever felt the sharp pang of glass against skin? It leaves no room for alternatives. Once it claims you, you are its forever, and will never be satisfied to simply open a door again!"

The merchant blinked. "So…are you going to buy anything or not?"

"That depends," Trust replied with over-exaggerated slyness. "on what it is you have for sale. Any 'specials' if you know what I mean."

"I…don't."

"Yes, you do. Preferably something in the jewelry department."

"I honestly don't really know what you're going on about."

Trust paused for but a second. "How about a certain something of untold value that would make for a lovely gift to a lady?"

Joy cringed at how purposefully bad his cover was. This needed to be fixed. She walked up to join him.

"Don't mind him," she assured the incredibly confused merchant. "He's…not exactly a people person. We just want to look around."

Still eyeing Trust warily, the merchant seemed to accept this and moved out of the way. "So long as you buy something."

Joy smiled politely and moved inside, dragging Trust with her.

As soon as they were hidden inside one of the aisles, she slapped him. "That was the most retarded thing you've ever done! What if he actually did know what you were talking about? Our cover would be blown and we'd have to escape with a hundred men after us. As it is, it didn't do anything helpful. Why the heck did you think that making so many blatant references was anything but a bad idea?!"

Trust almost looked offended. "Hey, I was just having a little bit of fun."

"Fun that could have killed us!"

"And it didn't."

Joy peeked past his shoulder and watched the merchant pick up a phone. "That's still up in the air. Let's just find it and get out of here. The sooner the better."

Trust nodded. "Fine. Are you ready?"

Joy sighed. "Of course. Just do it quickly. You know I won't be able to keep it up for very long."

Trust clapped his hands and Joy winced at the noise. "Let's do this, then."

Joy agreed. She clenched her hands quietly and began to breathe slowly. In, out. In, out. Focus.

She kept breathing as her hair slowly started to change color, until it was a dark grey instead of light brown. Grabbing Trust's hand, she closed her eyes and felt her energy begin to drain as she unleashed it. When she opened her eyes, time had crawled to a near-stop for everything except her and Trust.

She grit her teeth. "I can make it last longer if I stay still. You look."

Trust smiled, cracked his knuckles by moving his fingers, and vanished.

Moments later, he appeared again, just to check on how she was holding up, then vanished again. When she was concentrating so much, the normal time flow could regain control at any moment, which is why they had agreed to a mandatory check every few seconds while he explored.

Right now, Trust was teleporting all over the building, searching suspicious places and throwing things off the shelves in search of any one thing that could lead them to what they wanted.

Joy just concentrated on keeping time halted. She had, maybe, five minutes before she passed out. Whether or not time regained control before then was up to her.

Trust found it surprisingly quickly. Suddenly, he was right next to her, whispering in her ear that there was a trapdoor in the men's bathroom. She nodded, and replied in a half-whisper. "I can't move, or I'm going to break my concentration. I need you to teleport me in there."

Trust shrugged and laid a hand on her shoulder. Moments later, they were both on a staircase leading down to a pitch-black hallway.

With a sigh of relief, Joy let go of her hold on time, and felt things begin to speed up as her hair turned back to its normal color. She was still dizzy with much of her energy gone, though, and one step nearly sent her tumbling down the stairs. Luckily, Trust caught her arm right before she fell.

"Think you need the bracelet?" he questioned.

Joy shook her head, even though he couldn't see it in the dark. "No. Let's save that for something important. Can we get a little light, please?"

Trust raised his left hand and a fireball appeared over it, showing the hallway in front of them in full light. "Okay. Let's teleport."

"Is that necessary? Why don't we just walk down the stairs?"

"Because," Trust replied, "I happen to be one of the finest gentlemen on the planet-"

Joy snorted.

"-and would never take the chance of a wonderful gray-haired old lady like yourself tripping down these rather difficult stairs, and tumbling loudly enough to give us away. The alternative is us holding hands all the way down, but something tells me you'd like to be teleported."

Joy rolled her eyes. "Then do it."

Clapping his hand on her shoulder, Trust brought them to the bottom of the stairs in the blink of an eye.

"I'll be honest," he declared, "I feel really bad for everyone who can't teleport. It's so much easier and way more fun than walking."

"Yeah, thanks for raising my self-esteem," Joy muttered.

Trust raised an eyebrow. "Jealous, are we?"

Joy didn't dignify that statement with a response. "Let's get through this door."

Trust vanished.

Joy leaned against the wall of the suddenly-dark hallway, pursing her lips and waiting for him to realize he'd forgotten her.

It took about twenty seconds for light to fill the room again. "Whoops," Trust announced in such a way that made Joy wonder if he didn't do it on purpose. This time, she put _her_ hand on _his_ shoulder, just to make sure she wouldn't be left again.

Past the door, there were an assortment of odd pieces of technology, mostly large computers that probably shouldn't exist yet, but only one thing in the room interested either of them: a glowing glass case off to one side. Both walked over to it slowly, carefully, as if it could reach out and attack them at any moment. Due to Joy's spent energy, Trust made it first. He lowered him face until it was almost touching the glass before announcing "This is it, all right."

Joy hurried as best as she could for the last few steps and looked into the case.

There, positioned like any normal piece of jewelry, was a sliver necklace with a locket attached, the locket being in the shape of a crescent moon.

"You know what I think is in it?" Trust announced. "An ancient demon bent on world domination."

"Or information," Joy countered.

"Well, yeah, but evil demon sounds more interesting."

Joy shook her head. "Whatever the case, we need to find some way to quietly get it out first-"

Trust snapped his fingers, and suddenly the necklace was around Joy's neck.

He smiled charmingly. "Looks good on you."

Joy raised an eyebrow. "You realize how risky that was?"

Trust tilted his head. "Well, yeah, but, to be honest, I don't really care. Alarms would only make the mission somewhat entertaining."

"You're going to kill me one day."

"Yeah, probably," Trust answered nonchalantly. "Now, let's get out of here." He grabbed her shoulder and teleported them directly outside of the store.

Shaking off a slight wave of nausea from all the teleportation, Joy scolded Trust again. "That was even more dangerous. What if somebody, anybody, had been on this street?"

Trust stuck his tongue in his cheek. "Okay, gonna be honest; didn't think of that."

Joy shoved his hand off her shoulder. "Yeah, that's why you're supposed to tell me before you go teleporting around."

"Well, what else were we going to do? Teleport into the store and almost guarantee being seen by the merchant?"

"We could've left the old-fashioned way. You know, by walking."

"With both of us coming out of the boy's bathroom?"

"It'd raise less suspicion than teleportation would."

"Well, nobody saw us, so it's fine ."

"That's not the point. The point is-"

"The point is nobody saw us when we arrived, but somebody might see us arguing about it and ruin everything if we keep going on about it. Let's just be thankful everything wasn't screwed up and move on, okay?"

Joy was stopped in her place by Trust's sudden grasp on things and sensible reasoning. It caught her off guard. "Oh, uh, okay."

They started walked quickly back to the pick-up point.

"We're stopping by that Music Box place on the way home," Trust announced.

"If we fail because of a stupid Music Box, I _will_ kill you."

Trust chuckled as they turned a corner. "You'll have to- UGH!"

He was suddenly launched across the street by a stone fist and smashed into the side of a building.

Instantly Joy dropped to the ground and flipped underneath the next launching fist. She raised her head to get an eye of what was attacking them.

Oh, crap.

"Trust, we may need backup for this one."

Trust tore himself out of the rubble and groaned. "No kidding. Is that-"

Joy launched herself to the side, dodging another punch. "Yep."

"But how-"

"Just shut up and call in for help! I'll see if I can keep it distracted!"

Gritting his teeth, Trust reached over and tapped a clear-looking bracelet on his left wrist. Instantly a messaging board popped up in holographic form. Trust immediately put a call in to the HQ.

It rang.

And rang.

Cursing, Trust decided he couldn't wait for them to answer while Joy was almost dying every three seconds. He teleported into the midst of the fight.

He began to regret it almost immediately as he looked into the almost-robotic head of his attacker residing several stories above. He swallowed. This wasn't right at all. How could they have access to this thing?

"Trust, you better have put that call in!" Joy shouted at him.

"Still ringing." Trust decided to put his misgivings aside for now. He spread out his hands, unleashing torrents of flames from both of them, coating the giant stone creature in fire.

Through the flames, seemingly unaffected, the creature's fist came flying towards him. Unblinking, he immediately teleported directly off to the right, causing the attack to miss. Stretching out his hand, he summoned a ghost scythe, which he used immediately on the hand that had been aiming for him. It smashed into ghostly pieces and vanished the instant it hit the rocky hand.

Okay, Trust reasoned, it's tough. But I've probably faced tougher. He cast a quick invisibility spell over himself. It wouldn't last long, but it would have to be long enough. He moved his hand to his belt underneath his brown cloak and brought out his personal favorite wand. This ought to help him out somewhat. He began summoning ice and fire constantly, hitting the creature wherever he could while constantly dodging attacks and teleporting. None of them appeared to affect the stone tower before him at all. He teleported onto the creature's back and summoned several ghost daggers to his side, throwing them at the head, but, just like the scythe, they shattered on impact. Throwing out his wand to one side, he lifted a chunk of a nearby building telekinetically and dropped it on the stone head, but it didn't even act like it noticed. Most of its attention was still on Joy.

So, Trust thought, I can't do anything to it because it's too durable, and it can't do anything to me because I can teleport. Maybe if-

He was suddenly thrown off the stone giant's back and onto the ground. As soon as he landed, the creature stepped back, pressing him down into the street, with only his emergency wards saving him from death.

As soon as it lifted its foot, he tried to teleport away, but most of his mana was spent, and he accidentally ended up teleporting directly in front of the giant. Its massive head was instantly looking at him, and, without warning, a massive laser blast shot out of its eyes aimed directly for him. He wouldn't be able to get away in time.

Then Joy was in front of him, hair a blazing red, with a translucent shield held out in front out her outstretched arm that blocked the blast. She helped him up with her other hand. "We may need our bracelets."

"Yeah, I'd think so."

"Cover me."

Trust held out his wand, casting a small force field around them as Joy dropped her shield. She immediately tapped her own bracelet, and activated one of the options that popped up. Through use of magic and teleportation mechanics, a very light, though dense, cloth began to unfold from the bracelet and around her arm. It traveled upward, running alongside her forearm, then across her torso and around the other arm. In less than a minute, a full mythril set had materialized around her.

"The field can't take much more, Joy!" Trust yelled, rather unnecessarily, it seemed to Joy, as she was right next to him.

The hood materialized in her hand and she threw it on over her head, then inhaled sharply as her energy began to quickly replenish itself.

"Okay," she announced, "I can take the shield. Get your armor ready."

"I can't while I'm still calling!"

Joy whirled around. "You mean they haven't picked up yet?!"

Trust grimaced. "I'll be fine for a little while. We'll give them one more shot. See if you can distract it from me."

Joy rolled her eyes. "Fine. Drop the shield…now!"

Trust didn't have to. The shield took one more laser and shattered. Both of them instantly dived for cover, Trust landing on his stomach and Joy landing on one hand, cartwheeling off of it to plant her feet firmly on the ground. She ended up firmly on her face half a second later, however, when the giant slammed his fist into her and knocked her back by several feet.

Trust rose his wand, ready to cast a healing spell on her, though his mana was dropping very quickly, when suddenly he heard a voice in his ear.

"You've reached Bob's Hotspot for Hot Dogs. Our specialty today: Corn Dogs for only $99.99!"

"HQ! What took- wait, is this Life?"

"Why, do you feel it calling you?" Trust could almost feel the wink on the other side.

"First, that one made no sense-"

"Since when has Life ever made sense?" Another wink.

"-and second, WHAT TOOK YOU SO LONG?"

"Actually, I was on call duty, but I wasn't feeling-"

"You took a nap."

"A pretty good one."

Trust rubbed his forehead, exasperated. "Listen, Life, they have a Golem."

He waited for a shout of surprise or a mutterment of shock, but all Life said was "Uh-huh."

"It's kicking our butts. We need reinforcements."

"Hey, I could always head down there. Watch the carnage, maybe beat it up. Could be fun."

"Yeah, no. We need people who won't fall asleep in the middle of the fight. Who else is up there?"

"Not too many people, but I think I can get Sanity and Disgust there in a few minutes. They're working on something kinda nearby."

Trust glanced at the Golem raining blow after blow on Joy's weakening shield. "We don't have that long. Get them here as fast as possible."

"Sure."

"And stop answering the phone with that corn dog line!"

"Hey, but you know the saying: When Life give you corn dogs-"

Trust hung up and activated his armor.

Through the same mechanisms that had unfurled Joy's myrthril armor, he soon had a full purple robe and leggings on made of reinforced material, along with a masked hood, which he slipped on instantly. As soon as his entire spectral set was together, he felt his mana refilling. With a sigh of relief, he teleported next to Joy and brought up his own force field.

"Sanity and Disgust will be here soon, but not soon enough. We need to destroy this thing ourselves."

Joy's eyes narrowed as her shield dropped. "I have an idea."

"Of course you do."

Joy pulled in her lips. "See if you can get some damage into that head. I'll be attacking from the back. Make sure it can't hit both of us at the same time."

Trust nodded. "Can do." He dropped the shield and both of them rolled out of the way of the instantaneous laser blast.

Trust raised his wand to the sky, summoning dozens of icy shards to rain into the Golem's head, causing it to make some kind of rumbling angry noise and focus on swatting the shards above it while Joy move quickly and carefully behind it. Trust switched attacks and summoned flaming skulls to be launched at the towering rock giant, who swatted them like flies.

Joy's hair began to glow, and she unleashed a torrent of lightning at the Golem's back, forcing it to turn and attack her instead. Trust threw out razor-sharp typhoon circles, slicing through the Golem's head without too much of a visible effect, but still evidently angering it. The instant it had turned, though, Joy threw out several lasers that bounced off the giants back. She retrieved her personal Phantasm Bow, shooting out what appeared to be hundreds of arrows through use of a personal magic pool. Though the arrows each bounced off, they were like mosquito bites to the Golem, who immediately decided to ignore Trust and unleash his fury on Joy. He released dozens of fireballs, each of which was shot down and dissipated by well-placed lasers. Trust summoned dozens of phantom bats, each of which immediately homed in on the Golem's head, scratching, biting, and trying to pry it apart, makings sure the Golem had to pay attention to him.

This went on for a short while. Whenever one was in danger, the other would attack from the opposite side, so the Golem was never able to focus on just one of them and, in fact, rarely was able to launch his own attacks. The downside was, even with the power assistance of their armor sets, both of their energy reserves were going down rapidly. Joy was the first to recognize that they wouldn't last much longer, and raced over to the side, shooting Trust a look that told him everything he needed to know. Instantly, he dove over to his left, dodging a blast of fire, and then ran to catch up to Joy. They met by the Golem's side, and, without hesitation, Trust grabbed Joy's shirt and, after casting a quick strength-increasing spell on himself, launched her at the Golem's back. Right before she hit the Golem, he cast a Featherfalling spell on her, negating any damage the high-seed impact could have had. She grabbed onto the one of the many rocks lining up on the giant's back, and lifted herself up to stand on to of the creature. She ran as best as she could while balancing carefully all the way to the towering neck, where she unleashed huge waves of lasers at the connecting area, hoping to knock the head off. It cost her most of her energy, but, with a mighty thunk, the head toppled off. Trust, wasting no time, took hold of what was left of his mana and manipulated the earth around the head, causing it to fracture and open up around the head. The head fell into the hole and the earth closed up around it.

Joy jumped off the disabled back and landed next to him slowly, the Featherfalling spell still affecting her. "Well, that was something."

Trust was about to reply, but then he saw the body beginning to rise out of the corner of his eye. Turning to his right to face it, he muttered an exasperated "Aw, come on."

Instantly, Joy's hair went red, and she cast up a force field in front of them once more, just in time to block an incoming punch. "It's still alive?!"

Trust paused. "How long can you hold this?"

Beads of sweat were already showing up on Joy's forehead, but she wasn't immediately going to admit to weakness. "How long do you need?"

Trust eyed the store. "Give me thirty seconds."

"You have twenty."

"Done." He vanished.

He appeared inside the store they had just been in. The merchant was cowering behind the counter, which, seeing as the entire fight was viewable from his window, Trust wasn't surprised. He moved over to the merchant anyway, and, grabbing his shirt and raising him off the ground, demanded "Where are the potions?!"

The merchant meekly pointed to one end of the store. Trust tossed him to the ground again and teleported over to the corner he had pointed at. The selection of potions were pitifully few, but he didn't need anything elaborate. He immediately filled and downed a mana potion, and took an energy potion before vanishing again.

He appeared next to Joy and put up his own force field. "Drink this," he told her, handing her the potion with one hand.

She dropped her shield and eyed it skeptically. "Trust, you know we shouldn't drink potions, especially in the field. It messes with our-"

"Let Mercy worry about that. We're out of options."

She didn't raise any further complaints. She lifted the potion to her lips and drank the entire thing in one go.

As soon as she was done, she stood up. "Lower the field."

"You can handle it?"

She nodded as her hair turned into a blueish-green color. "You know what to do."

Trust chewed on his lower lip. "Yep."

Trust lowered the field right after the next punch, and Joy sped toward the Golem, suddenly moving at incredible speeds many Terrarians couldn't even dream of. In this form, Trust reasoned, she could probably race a bullet.

Joy launched herself into the air and delivered a powerful kick to the Golem's chest, knocking it almost off balance. Instantly, she was right behind it, jumping up and doing the same thing to its back. Unable to handle the sudden change in momentum, the Golem toppled over.

"Now!"

Knowing that the Golem would rise again in just a few seconds, Trust took the opportunity to charge up his final attack. He opened his hands and shoved his arms outward, right next to each other.

Particles of dust were drawn in.

The air grew colder.

And then, right as the Golem was beginning to get up, a massive wave of blue energy, frost magic, was released, engulfing the Golem.

Recognizing the threat, the Golem immediately got up and started moving. It threw a massive punch that might have ended Trust's life.

But it froze before it was anywhere near him.

If the Golem could have, it would have screamed as it slowly froze. When the blue energy had dissipated, the entire creature had been turned to ice.

Joy, still using her speed boost, ran, kicked off a wall, and aimed a kick directly for the center of the Golem's back. "Trust!"

Trust had almost no mana left. That last attack had taken it all out of him. But he did have just enough left to cast one last Titan spell on Joy as she flew toward the frozen Golem.

Joy's foot hit the Golem ice statue's back, and, thanks to the huge amount of momentum behind the kick and the Titan buff, the entire structure shattered.

Joy landed on the ground softly as all spells that had been cast on her wore off. Energy spent, she deactivated her armor, it all quickly folding back into the bracelet and the hood vanishing. She sat down against a wall, gasping for air.

Trust did the same and sat down next to her.

After a pause, she posed a question: "Did we just kill a god?"

Trust shrugged. "I think so."

They didn't say anything for a moment. Then, out of nowhere, Trust laughed.

"What's so funny?" Joy asked, though she was somewhat afraid to know.

"Oh, nothing. Just your hair."

"What's wrong with my hair?"

"Nothing. That's what's so funny. After all of that, not a single strand is out of place."

"Well, of course not," Joy declared, seemingly offended. "I'm a Stylist, and I'd have to be a terrible one not to keep my hair in place."

"Yeah, that's what makes it funny."

Before Joy could reply to this nonsensical statement, she heard a voice coming from nearby.

"Huh. Guess we were late to the party," Sanity declared.

Trust waved. "Hey, Leo."

Sanity held up a finger and winked. "Codenames, remember? You aren't even supposed to know that."

"Yeah, whatever." Trust waved this off. "Where's Disgust?"

"Grumbling. He's going to be quite upset when he finds out you were able to take care of this yourselves. Speaking of which, congratulations."

"Let me guess," Joy drawled. "You fought these things in basic training?"

"Oh, of course not. _Our_ Golems were much tougher."

"Hah, hah," Joy muttered sarcastically.

"Well," Sanity changed the subject, "Tell me you did retrieve the objective?"

Trust nodded, and Joy brought the necklace out from under her shirt. "Right here."

Sanity nodded. "Great. Let's get back to HQ, then."

Both of them rose from the ground, with Trust suddenly pausing halfway and stating "First, though, I need to visit a certain store. There's something I want to get."

Sanity raised an eyebrow. "Couldn't we just get whatever it is later?"

Joy held up a hand. "No, he's right. We need this now."

Sanity tilted his head slightly. "Well, okay, then."

Trust leaned over and whispered in Joy's ear. "Thanks."

She punched him lightly. "You're buying one for me."


	2. Chapter 2

**I iz backz**

 **For those of you getting into this story late and not sure when to start, the latest released chapter of "The Plague" is Chapter 19.**

…

 _Nine years ago…  
_  
Darius took a sharp breath and felt the sand hit his throat and vanish into his lungs. If he had any water left inside him, his eyes would be wet with it right now. He stopped for a moment to take out his long-empty canteen. There was no water in it, he knew, but that was not why he had taken it out. Silently, he filled the bottle with sand from his feet until it was heavy once more. He put the cap back on and returned it to its place hanging off his backpack, then smiled as he felt the added weight. It wasn't water, and the extra weight could infinitesimally slow him down, but the point was that it felt like it was filled with water. It wouldn't be long before he was delirious. If he could just convince himself he had water on him, perhaps he could go longer stretches without it, seeing as he could stop and take a drink at any time. He had learned a long time ago that an entire situation can turn around with a simple adjustment of the mind.

He blinked. He'd never known how much not being able to feel your eyes as they wet when you blinked actually hurt. He'd never even suspected it. All this was likely his fault for trying to cross the desert in the first place, and he willingly admitted it. Always admit fault, he remembered, and soon you will have none to admit. It was a proverb he had learned many years ago, and never forgotten. But despite the claims of the proverb, he still managed to find faults in himself. Far too many faults to go away with time, or even admittance. He shook his head. He couldn't let his mind wander. If his mind wandered, he would wander. And if he wandered, he was dead.

A village.

He saw it. It was in front of him. There were people walking in and out of houses as casually as if their village was located in some natural area of the world. Children played a game with stones. Mothers were getting…water…at the well.

Darius closed his eyes. He inhaled, and exhaled. Cleared his mind. He ran over several mathematical calculations in his head, to make sure it was working correctly. He calmed any thoughts, impulses, that he had. He had received strict training to ensure he saw no illusions or mirages. If he opened his eyes and the village was still there, it was real. He opened them.

It was there.

A wave of relief so intense it nearly made him nauseous washed over him. But, before he did anything irrational, he had to continue his objective. He calmly reached back into a side pocket off his backpack and grasped the object he felt. He brought it out and dropped it on the ground, where it immediately sank down into the sand.

Now, he was ready. 

It felt like it took hours to reach the village.

Once he was there, everyone paused on the street and turned to look at him. Darius guessed they weren't used to visitors, especially ones like this. With a broad-rimmed hat and a white cloak covering most of him, he was dressed in fair desert garb, but the sand and sweat form days of travel had transformed the outfit into somehow strange and almost disturbing in nature.

He dismissed the stares. No sense in getting riled up over nothing, especially with the only source of water for miles in front of him. Speaking of which, he finally reached the well. Quietly, he let the bucket drop, relishing the splash it made, and brought it back up with the rope. As soon as the bucket was off the rope, he sniffed and tasted the water. No poison, no nothing. Just clean water. Seeing this, he drank greedily.

After his thirst had been quenched a fair enough, but not enough so as he wouldn't vomit it all up later, he tied the bucket back to the rope and set it on the well once more. Now, for the first time, he fully looked up and exposed his face to everyone. The village was still staring at him. He'd have to stay here tonight, and he doubted there was a hotel anywhere. He needed to convince one of them to take him in for the night.

Then there was a scream, and the perfect opportunity presented itself. The old cliché, a runaway horse and a young child in its way. Nobody steps in for fear of losing their own life. Darius smiled. After this, there would almost certainly be one house he'd be welcomed in. He turned and watched as the calamity seemed to unfold itself. There was the horse. It was a beauty, with white-colored hair, spots of brown behind its ears. It was big, powerfully built, and, judging from the small horn protruding out of its skull, probably had a unicorn in the family line. And there was the child, a very young girl with blazing red hair, fallen on the road, tears flowing, too afraid to move, and everyone too afraid to help her.

Darius picked up a decent-sized stone that had evidently fallen from the well beside him. After a split-second he used to judge the angle and distance, he threw it. It landed just under one of the horse's front feet as it moved forward, causing the horse to trip and crash into the ground, grinding to a stop right before the girl was hit.

Darius was suddenly right beside her, offering his hand. "Well, I imagine that was quite the fright. You're unharmed, I see."

The red-haired girl blinked away her tears, instead staring in shock at the horse's body. It would right itself quickly, Darius knew, but he suspected it would be a little easier to handle now.

Now she looked directly at Darius, who offered a smile. The smile showed no teeth, and was as simple as raising one corner of his mouth a little higher than the other, but it was enough for the girl. She grabbed his hand firmly, as if she never waned to let go. Darius could still feel the fear emanating from her, not that he was surprised. Most people would be shaken from that experience. He used his hand as leverage, pulling her up to her feet.

Almost immediately, two adults rushed out of the small crowd and took hold of the girl's hands - clearly, these were the parents. As the mother reassured the girl, the father turned to Darius. He spoke without an accent. "You have our thanks, stranger. This is my six-year-old girl, and that's my wife. We don't have much, but anything we can give you-"

Darius held up his hand, stopping the father from speaking further. "Normally, I wouldn't dream of charging anything for something so simple. However, I'm afraid I do need boarding for the night. I can sleep on the floor quite easily, but I would like to be indoors."

The father was obviously gratified the request was so small. "We'll be happy to take you for the night, stranger."

"Please," Darius said, "call me Lucas."

…

Darius made sure that he was excellent company. He spoke of one or two adventures, never requested any food, water, or bedding, and only accepted once for each item offered, and shared both news and jokes from the outside world.

"We'd been here so long," the mother admitted, "I'd nearly forgotten there was a world outside this desert. Her arms were still around the young girl's neck - mothers tended to get like that after a situation that threatened the life of one of their children happened.

Darius, still known to them as Lucas, smiled. "If I'm successful, you'll be able to leave and visit at any time - and anyone wishing to travel from one side of the world to the other will be able to bypass the desert completely, leaving your village alone."

"I'll admit, I had some doubts," the father replied, "but this teleportation idea does seem like the best solution to both of our problems. I'm just happy you're not one of those people who wants to run us out of here."

Darius feigned innocence, but unlike others, he had no problem making it look incredibly convincing. "Who would want to do that?"

The father's eyes darkened. "Let's just say some people don't like the idea of a community, or even an individual, living by his own means. Seems to me they don't want anyone to believe it's even possible."

Darius nodded, as though he now understood. "Well, I'm proud to say I'm not one of them. Even if I was, however, you would have already proven me wrong several times. This community is thriving."

"We've worked very hard to make it that way," the father replied.

Darius glanced at the young girl. "The little one - what's her name?"

The parents both shared a glance. Instantly, though they did not know it, they had telegraphed several key details to Darius. He smiled and waited for an answer.

"Amber," the father finally answered.

Darius's eyes flashed once as he attempted to comprehend his sudden good fortune. "That's a beautiful name. Forgive me, I'm not exactly well-versed in traditional naming; what is her occupation?"

"Amber's occupation hasn't yet revealed itself," the mother replied. The answer sounded far too rehearsed. Darius still played along.

"Then," he remarked, "it is a shame that she won't have the name for long."

"Quite so," the father acknowledged. "Would you like some water, Mr…?"

Darius laughed cheerfully. "I already told you to please call me Lucas. As for the water, I hate to impose, but my water canister could use filling. I still have a journey ahead of me, after all."

The father nodded and smiled. "It's no trouble," he replied. "Darling, would you please help me with the water pump?" His tone was fake, Darius could tell. He wanted to talk to his wife about something. And he had a pretty good idea what that something was.

"Oh?" the mother seemed distracted. "Oh, of course." She hesitated, and then pulled away from the child and joined her husband outside.

Perfect.

Darius reached inside his backpack and seemingly accidentally dropped a spoon.

"Oh, son of a-" he seemed to restrain himself in the nick of time. He picked up the spoon. It was bent. The child looked up at him, confused.

He held the spoon out. "It's one of my most prized possessions. A spoon made of real silver, given to me by my grandfather right before he died." He pointed at the dent. "But now, it looks like nothing will fix that."

The child looked down at her lap, playing with what appeared to be a toy minecart. Then, for the first time since he had arrived, she spoke.

"I can help."

Her voice was melodious, almost magical in nature. It was sweet and kind, and yet interested and determined. Darius was honestly surprised by this. He took advantage of the surprise on his face to serve another purpose. "You can?"

She nodded and took the spoon. After a moment of concentration, the silver seemed to melt, to shift in her hand. Seconds later, it was returned to its normal shape, a spoon, without any blemishes whatsoever.

Darius smiled and said "Thank you." He stood up and turned around, where the mother and father were looking on, ashen-faced. He spoke to them. "I think her occupation just revealed itself."

"Please," the father begged him, "don't tell anyone! You've traveled the world! You know how rare Steampunkers are! If the northern army caught wind-"

"The third-rarest occupation in the world," interrupted Darius. "Still, I've seen a few of them. None of them were that powerful, not at this age. If she were discovered, she'd be beaten into shape and brainwashed to serve the military for the next fifteen years, and then put into the front lines of every battle." His eyes hardened. "I'd rather die than let that happen to anyone."

The father let out a sigh of relief. "So you won't tell anyone?"

"Not a soul."

"Oh, thank you. I'm sorry that we had to lie like that, but-"

Darius held up his hand, interrupting the father for the second time today. "Don't worry; I understand. Let it be forgotten."

But Darius knew he'd never forget.

This was a most successful mission.

…

 _Present day…_

"And here's the part where I yell at you for taking potions while in the field!" Mercy shouted. He stormed over to a drawer, where he drew out a large scalpel-like object. "Do you have any idea what that could have done to the wiring in your neural network?"

"No, of course I don't," Trust muttered. "It's not like you've told us a dozen times already."

"Only because you don't listen!" Mercy brought the tool up to Trust's ear, which he pulled down slightly. Right there, covered by his ear, was an incredibly tiny data node. Mercy scratched this with the tool, and it responded with a series of clicks and a light.

"We were facing _a golem_. At some point, we're exempt from these dumb restrictions."

Mercy rolled his eyes. "Oh, why should I be surprised? It's not like you have any regard for safety whatsoever, Trust. You teleport in and out of places at random, practice bits of your playacting during missions, and you even use Sanity's real name in public!"

Trust growled. "Why do we have to use his stupid codename? His name is Leo, and everyone knows it. What's the point? Heck, what's the point behind any of our codenames? I can understand if some people want their normal lives to be secret, but to be assigned a new name and told to never tell anyone your real one…"

Mercy sighed and backed up. "Our superiors give us our new names for a number of reasons, Trust. What if our signal was hacked into? Or you saved a kid and became a local hero? Or if one of the agents went bad? Not knowing your real name could save your life and anyone close to you."

"Then we should be allowed to make that decision ourselves." Trust wasn't giving up his argument yet. "Besides, what's the point of naming us after, you know, emotions? Doesn't that seem the slightest bit…absolutely absurd to you?"

"You know exactly why we're given those names," Mercy replied. "By naming ourselves after ideals, one day we may become those ideals."

Trust laughed.

Mercy winced. "Your laugh has to be either the stupidest or most disturbing thing I've ever heard. When will your voice box ever reach above that of an eight-year-old?"

"Hey, it's only my laugh, and I can't exactly control that." Trust sounded offended. "My point is, I highly doubt that ridiculous explanation is the real reason. Who wants a member of their secret supersolider team to be the embodiment of Hatred, or Cruelty, or Lunacy?"

Mercy shrugged and scanned the node with some sort of light. "For every yin, there's a yang. If there's Love here, there should be Hatred. Mercy, Cruelty. Sanity, Lunacy. It's how everything is balanced. A human soul couldn't survive without this balance of light and darkness."

"Hah," Trust snorted. "I don't believe that. Everyone knows that even a small beam of light always sends the darkness flying. Light has always, and will always, prevail over darkness. To want to have both in the same body is absurd."

"We can't show light without darkness," Mercy argued. "A little darkness in a life full of light can be healthy."

"Oh, yes," Trust replied sarcastically. "Just like a little poison in a glass full of good water can be healthy. As long as there is darkness, the light has to extinguish it. It can do nothing but hurt you. Look at this." He held up a finger, and a ball of white, warm light appeared above it. "This is pure light. No darkness inside. It's beautiful."

"It will make you go blind."

"If we think darkness is healthy, we're already more blind than we thought possible."

Mercy sighed. "Look, Trust, we agreed to disagree, remember? We're done with this conversation. And your check-up, in fact. You'll suffer some headaches and nausea, but you'll live. Don't be surprised if you have problems interfacing with any bracelet systems, though."

Trust got up off his chair. "I guess we're lucky to have a Witch Doctor on hand, huh?"

"Is it physically impossible for you to not just call me a Doctor? Do you have to add the Witch part?"

Trust raised an eyebrow. "Why not? I could swear I've seen you riding a broom around here and cackling evilly." 

Mercy shook his head. "You'd better report to the briefing room. Everyone else is already there."

"Everyone else, meaning…?"

"Meaning everyone who was on board or on missions when you finished your mission, yes. There's no reason to call in everyone."

"Great. Just great." Trust moved toward the door.

"You might want a change of uniform," suggested Mercy.

Glancing down, Trust saw he was merely wearing a standard patient's cloak. Although it covered him near-completely, it certainly wasn't proper uniform. "Oh, yeah. Thanks. That might have attracted some stares."

"Knowing you," Mercy said dryly, "you probably wouldn't have minded. Everyone's attention on you, for once."

Trust reached out and grabbed his official uniform. He smiled a full-toothed smile at Mercy. "As a matter of fact, that's true. I like staring."


End file.
